She says that saffron should be roasted very lightly in a plain cast-iron frying pan (I have one of those tiny little Lodge 4" pans that I use for roasting all sorts of spices), just until it darkens a shade, and then crumbled into a small amount of piping hot milk to soak for 2-3 HOURS. Then use the milk, saffron and all, in a recipe or put it into your sauce.
Here's the recipe for green beans, with a few editorial comments gleaned from experience:
Gujarati sem (Gujarati green beans):
1 lb. very fresh and tender young green beans
4 TBS vegetable oil (I use peanut oil bec. it has almost no flavor)
1 TBS whole black mustard seeds (these are not the yellow-brown seeds ground up to make Western mustards. They are small and very dark reddish brown, almost black, and you can get them whole in oriental markets or farmers markets that cater to the Eastern customers)
4 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 to 1 hot dried red chili, coarsely crushed (There is an Indian dried red pepper (lal mirch) 1 1/2 to 2 inches long & very slender. You can get them in Eastern markets. I use the little tiny French ones, milder than the black Chinese ones. Habanera is WAY too hot, & the Mexican chili peppers don't have the right flavor.)
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp sugar
Black pepper ground in the mill.
Wash & trim the beans and cut them into 1 inch lengths. Blanch them by dropping into water at a rolling boil and boil for 3-4 minutes. Arrest the cooking by draining and rinsing in cold running water.
Heat the oil in a large saute pan (I like the high sided Italian kind rather than a slope-sided American fry pan - the beans jump out of the latter) over a medium flame. Once the oil is hot, put in the mustard seeds. Once the seeds begin to "pop", put in the garlic. Stir until the garlic turns light brown. Then put in the chili pepper and stir for a few seconds. Add beans, salt, & sugar and stir. Turn the heat down to low and stir and cook for 7-8 minutes for the beans to absorb the flavors. Toss with freshly ground black pepper to taste and serve at once.